by Marcus James
Kuri held his hand out to her. He was naked and beautiful, and yet undeniably fearsome in all of his sculpted and golden luster and Kathryn did not know if she should take his hand or try to get out of wherever she was.
“Please. I will keep my word. You cannot stop what is going to happen. You cannot hope to escape your fate, and we will not be swayed from our duty. We can either succeed, or the prophecy can. You have a choice to make. I am only able to do so much. My free will is limited.”
“You don’t want to see me die...”
Kuri closed his eyes for just a moment and sighed. When he opened them again, they were glorious in their indifference.
“I want justice to be served.”
Kathryn nodded. She understood his words as much as she could. They both had a part to play, and the chips would fall however they may, but at least she could have a chance to decide if it was worth the fight.
With her other hand she allowed him to pull her up off the ground and together they walked towards the very edge of the temple. Like an open villa it looked out on lush gardens and dark seas not too far off in the distance, and everywhere she looked there were great statues of monstrous beasts and the faces of golden deities that looked down upon them all.
“Where are we?” she asked him, trying to make sense of it all.
He looked at her proudly and extended an arm out, sweeping the air across their vision. “This is Uruk. Long before Babylon and Ur. This is the temple of Anu-my father.”
Kathryn could not stifle her shock. “How are we here?”
Kuri laughed. “I can do all things. For I am Kurigalzu. Son of Anu and Ki. Brother of Arishaka and Niiqiarqusu. Leaders of the Anunnaki. The seven judges of man and gods alike.”
He spoke with assuredness and authority, and Kathryn began to weave the answers together herself. “Children of Gods...”
“And yet, not gods ourselves.”
“If not gods... then?”
“Sprits of a different breed.”
Kathryn looked out on the city below. The streets were crowded. They were several stories above ground, and a steep polished stone staircase led to the bustling city arteries.
How big was this temple, she couldn’t be certain. She knew by its massive design and the many levels she saw below, with its grass-laden grounds and stone benches that it was a ziggurat; the pyramid-like structures commonly found in the valleys of the ancient Mayan and Aztec; ancient temple ruins that kathryn had camped in the summer after graduation, the summer that had begun with Sheffield’s departure from Bellingham and their relationship.
“And where is Uruk?” she asked him.
“In present day Iraq.” Kuri’s gaze fell to those steps, and Kathryn followed, and in the distance she could see a procession-thirteen people long-make their way in single file up the temple steps towards them.
“Who are they?” Kuri sighed and continued to keep his eyes fixed on them.
“They are the beginning of everything and the end. The priestesses of Inanna-Ereshkigal. The infernal and vengeful form of the goddess Inanna. Inanna who came to the nether-world-the land of the Anunnaki and there we looked upon her and she became that of a corpse and was hung from a stake.
“Through her own powers and cries, the Queen of Heaven was restored and fled the nether-world and from this act, she gained dominion over death and the spirits, and made a kingdom of the graves.”
“She sounds like Hecate.”
Kuri snickered and gave a slow nod. “You could say they are one in the same. Just another path. When Ereshkigal was carried by her disciples into the Mediterranean, her name converted with language, or perhaps it was the name she chose for herself; who knows. But by the time she arrived her name had become Hecate.
“But, that is for another conversation entirely, and not at all why you are here.”
They continued to watch the procession-the thirteen women, baring torches and dressed in soft white linen. They looked beautiful and pure. They seemed innocent and untouched, and yet these women-these shadows of the past had rouged lips and dark shadow on their eyes, as if painted up for a prospective lover. The lips were red and seemed to glisten in the firelight, along with the shadow on the eyes.
“They’re so beautiful.” Kathryn observed as these women ascended the steps and entered the temple, moving in single file to that sunken floor in front of that enormous stone hearth.
Kuri smiled and leaned into Kathryn, he was so close that the heat of his breath was on her ear, and the intoxicating smell of him filled her nostrils and sent a tremor down her spine.
“They would crush gems like rubies and onyx into fine powder to paint their eyes and lips with. They are here to give themselves to us. They came to be beseech of the Anunnaki.”
Kathryn looked at him in recognition. She was beginning to piece together where all of this was headed. “For what?”
“Protection for another year, healthy crops. Justice against the people of the mountain. Who knows.” Kuri said indifferently.
“They were to be the brides of the Anunnaki and in their death they would reign in the kingdom of the fates and for this the priestesses of Inanna kept themselves pure for us. From the moment of birth they were chosen for this as we had demanded it. We had wanted to know these mortals. We had wanted to understand how they were happy in their servitude of us and eventually we wished to know them as man would know each other.
The last of these women, bedecked in glittering jewels that stood in ethereal contrast to her bronzed skin and black hair, pulled with her a full grown fit male, who seemed drugged and who shuffled along in a stupor behind her.
Once she was before the hearth with the man, the women began to chant “Anu-Anu-Anu-Ki” over and over again, while she petted the prisoner’s head and from the hand of another priestess, was given a sharp blade, which she quickly brought across his throat.
The man cried out in helpless agony as the red hot crimson spilled from the incision and pooled on the stone beneath their feet.
Their chorus of song grew louder as they brought the man down gently to the ground and with a ferocious urgency; the woman shoved that blade into his chest, dragging it down towards his stomach, and split him open. Intestine, bile, and blood spilled from the interior and with her hand she shoved it inside, while the women began work on his head.
Kathryn watched in fascination as another one of these priestesses removed a small mallet from the leather belt around her waist and began smashing the skull. They all took turns, paying no mind to the bits of bone, blood, tissue, and hair that went flying, as they fought quickly to get inside.
The woman who had slit the man’s throat and had now stuck her hand inside the carcass, removed the heart and held it high in the firelight. The deep red slipped down her hand and made its way like the path of rivers on her arm on its journey to her elbow.
The others finally got inside the skull, and delicately removed the brain. The slick of membrane reflected the firelight like gelatinous water, and together they made their way to that great fire and tossed the heart and brain into the flames.
The smell was putrid and sour, and Kathryn found herself coughing and gagging. For a moment she thought this would somehow make these shadows of the past aware of her and Kuri’s presence, but it did not.
“They are feeding us. The fragrance and smoke is what fed us, and though we had already heard their calls, the burning of the offering made us pay attention.
“We took the form that would be most pleasing to them. We used our thoughts to create our form-to be the most beautiful examples of their species, and once we had completed this form, we came to them.”
Kathryn looked on as the vision she had stumbled on days ago came back and took shape before her as Arish, Niiq, and Kuri appeared as particles of light and smoke that came together in a great swirl and pieced themselves together like pieces of a puzzle connecting quickly and forming their great image.
The women laid down and as Ka
thryn had stumbled in the first time, the great orgy commenced and Kathryn could feel the spark of titillation once again as she watched this great coupling.
When it was over, the shadows of Arish, Niiq, and Kuri dissipated and the priestesses were as they had been before; spent and lost in euphoria.
They slept and once again, Kathryn moved closer, Kuri followed, and together they witnessed the sudden swelling of the bellies and the movement within.
“And this,” Kuri said, his eyes glittering and his face cast in shame as they watched; “This is where the course of the cosmos changed.”
The night changed into day and day once again became night. Time had moved in seconds and Kathryn found it dizzying as those wombs grew and grew.
“It took a day for those things to grow. We had no idea that we as demigods could actually produce anything in our copulation with mortal women, and then from the heavens we watched as these things came into being.”
The priestesses woke from their slumber crying out in agony and looking down at their engorged stomachs in horror, their legs spread open, and they screamed as their fluids rushed out from their sex and they all looked to one another-black eyes wide in confused terror as little hands and little heads emerged from them.
“My God!’ Kathryn cupped her hand to her mouth and shook her head frantically. She felt sick, and the urge to vomit was strong. The acidic taste burned her throat and she forced it back down as she looked on. She wanted to turn away from the nightmare she was seeing and yet she could not seem to find the will to turn her eyes from it.
They looked on as those babes slithered out, covered in fluid and with arms and legs that seemed to be too long, nothing like a human infant, and they began to pull on the umbilical cords and bring them to their mouths-which were already full of tiny teeth-and began to gnaw and tear. The women screamed as these offspring grunted and cried and to Kathryn’s disgust, began to devour the tether to their mothers.
Before their very eyes these things-these mutant infants began to grow-their arms and legs stretched and became thick with fat and muscle, and their bodies slowly grew larger and larger in size.
The priestesses passed out from the shock. At first Kathryn had thought them dead, but upon closer inspection, she could see their chests rises and fall with shallow breaths.
Those creatures crawled over to the split carcass of the man and like little piglets at a troth, began to feed and tear the flesh. They were nothing short of beasts and they grew thick and wide and each one was male and between his legs their cocks matured and became erect.
Once again night passed into day and day back into night in the blink of an eye, and in that time all thirteen of these offspring grew tall and into maturity. They got to their feet and stood on strong legs and stretched and cracked their bones as they grew accustomed to their limbs, and yet no hair covered their bodies. They were grotesque and beautiful in one awful measure, and when those priestesses came out of their delirium and exhaustion, they saw these monstrously beautiful and naked creatures before them.
Taunt golden flesh covered in the stain of blood and amniotic fluid, and their eyes were hungry and their cocks still hard.
The women seemed confused and it seemed to take them a moment to understand who these things were and where they had come from, but once they looked down at their naked bodies and the stain on their thighs and on the stone beneath them, they began to scurry back.
Those things-their giant offspring, who at this point seemed to stand at six feet-moved onto them, holding them down hard against the stone, and they began to suckle from the space between their legs.
“What they wanted was not the milk, what they needed to grow strong was the blood.” Kuri said to her.
Indeed they seemed to be devouring the massacre between the women’s legs, and as they did, Kathryn watched in horror as these thirteen creatures continued to elongate.
Then like animals in heat, these beasts mounted the priestesses. Kathryn could not fathom if they were copulating with their own mothers or each other’s mothers, but it was savage. Not a rape as Kathryn would define the word, for the women found pleasure in their agony and writhed beneath these strong and terrible giants, and the thrust of their cocks inside of them seemed to delight the women just as their orgy with Arish, Niiq, and Kuri had delighted them, and once it was finished, those giants slipped their heads back down between their legs and once again began to suckle the blood from the tearing they had caused.
“Will there be more giants?” Kathryn asked Kuri. He shook his head.
“No. Not Giants. Something else, a new human. Same as all the others and yet touched by the divine.”
Once again time sped, days and nights passing by, and the women stayed in this temple with these giants, and Kathryn saw their wombs grow over the course of nine months, and each gave birth to a single child. Boys and girls both, and time continued to move and Kuri once again spoke.
“These children could hear the voices of the dead and see their shades. They could speak directly to the gods and they could make the gods listen. They could affect the people and environment around them and hear the inner thoughts of others. Things that were the explicit rights of the gods were now the privileges of these thirteen children.
“Each had been born a minute apart, and each grew at the normal human rate, but in this time, our offspring, the Anak-or sons of Anunnaki-as they were called then, and would later be known as Nephilim, began to demand to be worshiped as gods on earth and they fought against all enemy tribes from the outlying mountains, making Uruk a terrifying place for any rival kingdom.
“It was not that they claimed to be appointed by the gods as so many kings claimed, but that they were gods themselves, and the most arrogant of these was the Anak who would be king; his name was Ubara-Tutu and he was fierce and bloodthirsty.”
Time sped once again, and on a golden throne they saw this giant sit. He was covered in jewels and dwarfed the humans who came before him. There were prisoners naked and chained and brought to him and his brothers, and their throats were slit and the blood served to them in golden cups which they drank and the flesh of those newly dead were pulled apart with their bare hands and they ate the flesh off of the bone.
“All offerings to the true gods were ceased and in the dark of night people prayed to the Anak-or Nephilim-their living gods on earth-and not to the true gods in the stars, the sun, and the earth below and around them.
“The only ones who honored us and praised us in this time were the children of our children, and one of these, a male named Xisuthrus was the most devote of all. He, along with his wife who too was one of these divine children, led the other eleven in praise of us and prayed for relief while their fathers, who had long ago devoured their own mothers-our betrothed brides-made their children use their strange and awesome abilities to bring storms and death to all those who would disobey or seek to challenge the Anak.
In the divine world the gods became enraged and decreed vengeance and a call to balance. All of Uruk had to be wiped clean, and the Anak and their children-our spawn-had to be eradicated and all that was had to be purified and begun anew.”
“What did you do?” Kathryn asked him as they continued to watch time move.”
Kuri looked at her smirked. “We salted the earth.”
Everything changed. The great temple disappeared as if the world had turned while Kuri and Kathryn had stared at one another, and when she looked from him, they were standing on the edge of a mountain top overlooking a great river that led to the sea.
It was the familiar scene from her vision. The great winds, the storm, the earthquake, the crumbling rocks, and the cries of agony as those three winged creatures, along with four others who burst forth from the earth-creatures with great black wings, talon hands covered in scales like a bird, and the heads of eagles with great hooked beaks and the golden bodies of sculpted men in ancient warrior garb of bronzed breastplates and belts above loin cloth-began to the
destroy the city.
The waters began to rise quickly and the skies became black as pitch and lit up with shockingly yellow lightning. Kathryn watched as a throng of people hurried into a great ship below. She could see goats, oxen, and birds, and at once she thought of the biblical tale of Noah and his Ark.
“Yes,” Kuri said to her with a nod. His eyes falling on the same sight. “This is where so many Christian tales emerged.”
“Who are they?” Kathryn asked as the wind howled about them. Kuri took hold of her hand and steadied her in the winds and the overflowing waters of the river. She closed her eyes to brace herself against the sand and wind and lightning, and then there was nothing.
There was the sound of winds howling somewhere outside of where they were, and she heard chanting and the crying of others, and everywhere was the scent of livestock.
Kathryn opened her eyes to see that they were within this great boat. It was made of thick cedar. She could smell it all around them, and there were ladders everywhere she looked that led to other levels above and beneath them, and amongst some of these she recognized the children of the Anak.
“Witches...” Kathryn whispered in realization.
“Though Enlil wanted all of Uruk to be destroyed and the Anak and their children wiped out, Enki, god of magic, creation, intelligence, and the seas appeared to Xisuthrus-for he favored the children of the Anak-and he commanded Xisuthrus on what to do.
“He instructed him to build this great boat, and to take all the children of the Anak with him, along with those hundred mortals who never bowed to the Anak in their hearts, and leave Uruk the day of the eradication.
“When it was all over, when the days and nights had passed and the waters of the rivers had receded and the streets were littered with bodies and the Anak had been destroyed by the hands of the very beings who created them, Xisuthrus, his wife, and the other eleven children abandoned the boat and made their way out into the world.
“Some separating, others taking with them lovers, both witches and non-witches alike, and Xisuthrus, after having made offerings and sacrifices to the gods with his brethren, ordered those mortals who he had spared to return to Uruk and create a new city. A city that honored all the gods and never made the mistake of abandoning them again.